El Paso District Attorney Bill Hicks announces campaign to retain seat

El Paso District Attorney Bill Hicks, who Gov. Greg Abbott appointed to fix a district attorney's office mired in controversy, will seek to retain the seat.

Hicks, a prominent attorney with decades of legal experience, announced Monday, Nov. 6, the launch of his election campaign to retain the highest law enforcement seat in West Texas.

"After looking at all the other candidates out there, and after looking at the goals and the things that we have started to do over the past year, I don't think that we're going to be able to finish all of the great projects that we've started," Hicks said. "We've started reconstituting our domestic violence program. We've started a DWI program. None of these programs are going to be in the position that I want them to be for another two or three budget cycles.

"The domestic violence program, which was a nationally award-winning program under the (former District Attorney Jaime) Esparza administration and was totally obliterated under the (former District Attorney Yvonne) Rosales administration, we've started to rebuild it, but it's not going to be at that level of a national award-winning position until a couple of budget cycles because it takes that to rebuild that type of a program. I can't assure the public that it's going to be raised to that level unless I'm in charge."

Hicks joins a growing field of candidates seeking the seat of District Attorney of the 34th Judicial District, which serves El Paso, Hudspeth and Culberson counties.

So far Hicks is the only Republican candidate to announce they are seeking the seat. The three other candidates — Nancy Casas, James Montoya and Alma Trejo — who have launched bids for the seat are all running as Democrats.

"I'm running as a Republican because when you are appointed by the governor, you honor the governor's request to run as under his title, which is a Republican," Hicks said.

More: El Paso district attorney borrowing county funds to hire staff for Walmart shooting case

Hicks took over as El Paso district attorney after the resignation of former District Attorney Yvonne Rosales.

Abbott appointed Hicks in December 2020 to the seat as Rosales left office amid several controversies and a petition asking a Texas court to remove her from office because of alleged official misconduct and incompetence.

Rosales resigned before the petition went to trial.

Hicks took over an El Paso District Attorney's Office with an understaffed team and a backlog of more than 10,000 cases.

Since taking office, Hicks and his administration have lowered the backlog to about 3,000 cases, Hicks said. The DA's office also has hired several prosecutors and staff, including well-known and experienced attorneys, to handle the El Paso Walmart mass shooting case.

"It was well over 10,000 cases when we took office," Hicks said. "We're down to just over 3,000 cases now. We're going to have that backlog resolved by 2024. That's because of the dedication, work and organization that my management team put into place in less than two years. The Rosales administration took what was a negligible backlog and blew it up to over 10,000 cases. A leadership that has a lack of experience, a lack of foresight in how they're managing that office can take the office from moving justice forward to stagnating the office, or maybe worse, moving the office backwards, really justice backwards.

"And because of that, my fear for this criminal justice system is that without the proper leadership, our criminal justice system doesn't continue to move forward. It starts moving backwards. And I don't want to see that. I want to make sure that our criminal justice system continues to move forward."

Hicks, who received his law degree from Texas Tech School of Law, has several decades of experience practicing law, including as a district court judge, a state prosecutor and a private practice lawyer.

He worked as an assistant district attorney for the El Paso District Attorney's Office for over 12 years, including working as a special prosecutor in the Metro Narcotics Task Force, a senior trial attorney in the Special Crimes Unit and a trial team chief, according to his biography.

Hicks also was appointed in 2010 by former Gov. Rick Perry to preside over the 243rd District Court in El Paso after the sitting judge left the bench. He presided over the court until 2012.

He then started his private practice focusing on mediation, arbitration and personal injury, his biography states.

Hicks joins several candidates with decades of legal experience and ties to El Paso seeking the district attorney seat. As of Nov. 6, three other candidates have announced their bids for the position.

More: District Attorney Bill Hicks making progress on Walmart case, but case backlog lingers

Casas and Montoya, former assistant district attorneys with years of legal experience, and Trejo, former El Paso County Criminal Court #1 judge, launched their campaigns earlier this year.

Candidates can officially file for election Nov. 11. The filing deadline for candidates is Dec. 11.

The primary election will be on March 5, 2024, with early voting from Feb. 20, 2024, to March 1, 2024.

Aaron Martinez may be reached at amartinez1@elpasotimes.com or on Twitter @AMartinezEPT.

This article originally appeared on El Paso Times: El Paso DA Bill Hicks announces campaign to retain seat